” The work that the 400 SCE IT employees do isn’t disappearing, instead it and their jobs are being taken over by foreign guestworkers here on H-1B visas. Those guestworkers are employed by the two leading India-based outsourcing firms, Tata Consultancy Services and Infosys.

The SCE workers are wondering: “Why should I lose my job when the work still needs to be done? Why is the government doing this to me and my family?”

Adding to the injustice of losing their jobs, the SCE workers are being forced to do something that is so common in the industry it is a term of art: “knowledge transfer,” an ugly euphemism that means being forced to train your own foreign replacement. The SCE workers are, “demoralized; in disbelief; beyond furious; down in the dumps; feeling anguish; depressed; feeling dehumanized; feeling humiliated; worrying about the future; worrying about paying the bills.”

The SCE workers rightly place the culpability squarely on SCE executives, the president, and Congress. One worker simply said, “Shame on Edison for doing this and shame on our politicians for enabling it.”

H-1B visas are temporary work permits issued by the U.S. government that are good for up to six years. The intent is for these visas to be used only when an American worker cannot be found. In fact, the U.S. Department of Labor states, “The Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) requires that the hiring of a foreign worker will not adversely affect the wages and working conditions of U.S. workers comparably employed.”

In practice, the H-1B visa has been used for years to undercut American workers with lower-wage, and often lesser-skilled, workers brought in from overseas. How does this happen? Congress sets the wage floors for H-1Bs, and it has set it far below market wages.”

Since the 2005-06 school year, the percent of students enrolled in English proficiency classes has increased by an average of nearly 70 percent across seven school districts in the D.C. metro area, according to a report by the advocacy group, Federation for American Immigration Reform, which promotes tighter border security, an end to illegal immigration and reduced levels of legal immigration.

Those classes cost an average of about one quarter of each district’s budget, and the chunk is getting larger as new students, many of them illegal immigrants or children of illegal immigrants, enroll in English-as-a-second-language classes.

Disproportionate enrollment increases in the English-learner classes is troubling, because non-English speakers can cost up to twice as much as their proficient counterparts, according to the report.

“ Education experts have long realized that the cost of educating a student who is not proficient in English far exceeds the amount actually allocated,” the report said.”

” President Obama is unveiling a $3.99 trillion budget that is “designed to bring middle class economics into the 21st Century,” the White House announced Monday.

The proposed budget “invests in helping working families make their paychecks go further, preparing hardworking Americans to earn higher wages, and creating the infrastructure that allows businesses to thrive and create good, high-paying jobs,” the White House said in a statement.

To pay for new tax credits and other programs involving education, child care, paid leave, and new road and bridge construction, the budget calls for tax hikes on wealthier Americans by closing certain loopholes.

Congressional Republicans said the president’s proposals — many of which leaked out in advance of Monday’s announcement — involve too many tax hikes and high-spending programs.”

Here are just a few of the goodies to be redistributed by the State under “Uncle” Barack’s proposed budget :

” Among the economic plans in the proposed budget:

• A child care tax credit of up to $3,000 per child.

• $750 million for a Department of Education preschool development program, an increase of $500 million.

• More than $3 billion for science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education.

• A $500 tax credit for “second earners” in working families.

• A program encouraging paid leave programs for employees.

• Two years of community college tuition for qualified students, a program that would cost $60 billion over 10 years.

” The IRS is considering its own temporary shutdown due to recent budget cuts enacted by Congress, its chief said Thursday.

IRS Commissioner John Koskinen said furloughs — forced unpaid days off for employees as part of an IRS closure — is one idea reluctantly being tossed about to save money, though they are hoping they will not have to go there.”

” “ People call it furloughs; I view it as: Are we going to have to shut the place down? And at this point, that will be the last thing we do, … but there is no way we can say right now that that wont happen,” Koskinen told reporters at a Thursday press conference on the upcoming tax season. “Again, I would stress that would be the last option.”

He said a shutdown would mean the IRS would “close the agency for a day, two days, whatever days it would take to close the gap that we can’t otherwise close in a reasonable way.”

” Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) released his annual Wastebook this past week. It contains a laundry list of doozies. The U.S. government’s gold-plating operations included $190,000 to study compost digested by worms, $297 million for the purchase of an unused mega blimp, and $1 million on a Virginia bus stop where only 15 people can huddle under a half-baked roof. These questionable (read: absurd) expenditures only represent the tip of the iceberg.

Just consider the following: the Speaker of the House currently receives an annual salary of $223,500, and will receive a payment of roughly that amount, depending on the years of service, for life. An annual payment of this magnitude amounts to about five times the average annual wage in the United States. But that’s not all. For those who have had different positions in Congress, their retirements can be augmented. For example, Nancy Pelosi will not receive $223,500 for life, but roughly double that. Why? Because she is a member of Congress, currently the House of Representatives’ Minority Leader, and a retired Speaker of the House. For purposes of computing retirement pay, Congress adds and accumulates. They do not net.”

Congress’s main job is to budget. But when it comes to passing annual spending bills, members of Congress have not accomplished that in full and on time since 1997. Many were hopeful Congress would use this year’s head start into the appropriations process (Congress agreed on the spending level in December 2013, instead of April 2014) to actually meet the deadlines, but such hope has long given way to resignation. There is simply not enough time left in this fiscal year. “

” 109,631,000 Americans lived in households that received benefits from one or more federally funded “means-tested programs” — also known as welfare — as of the fourth quarter of 2012, according to data released Tuesday by the Census Bureau.

The Census Bureau has not yet reported how many were on welfare in 2013 or the first two quarters of 2014.

But the 109,631,000 living in households taking federal welfare benefits as of the end of 2012, according to the Census Bureau, equaled 35.4 percent of all 309,467,000 people living in the United States at that time.

When those receiving benefits from non-means-tested federal programs — such as Social Security, Medicare, unemployment and veterans benefits — were added to those taking welfare benefits, it turned out that 153,323,000 people were getting federal benefits of some type at the end of 2012.

Subtract the 3,297,000 who were receiving veterans’ benefits from the total, and that leaves 150,026,000 people receiving non-veterans’ benefits.

The 153,323,000 total benefit-takers at the end of 2012, said the Census Bureau, equaled 49.5 percent of the population. The 150,026,000 taking benefits other than veterans’ benefits equaled about 48.5 percent of the population. “

The board — the first since early 2013 — will convene Oct. 27, according to a Navy document released Aug. 14.

At risk are between 7,500 and 8,000 retirement-eligible active and reserve E-7s, E-8s and E-9s with at least at least three years’ time in rate.

But there is a big upside to the process: Clearing out senior enlisted who have engaged in misconduct or whose performance has slipped noticeably makes way for hot running sailors to move up.

The board has no exceptions; even the most senior sailors — up to and including Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy Mike Stevens — will have their records reviewed.”

These military purges serve multiple purposes for the Obama regime: They free up moneys to fund more “social programs” read: vote buying , they rid the service of the most experienced war fighters thus continuing Obama’s policy of weakening our national security and they allow the tyrant to install personnel more loyal to himself all under the guise of being more responsible with our taxpayer dollars .

” About 550 Army majors, including some serving in Afghanistan, will soon be told they have to leave the service by next spring as part of a budget-driven downsizing of the service.

Gen. John Campbell, the vice chief of the Army, acknowledged Friday that telling troops in a war zone that they’re out of a job is a difficult task. But he said some of the soldiers could join the National Guard or the Army Reserve.

The decision to cut Army majors comes on the heels of a move to slash nearly 1,200 captains from the ranks. Army leaders were criticized at the time for giving 48 of them the bad news while they were deployed to Afghanistan.

The Army declined to say how many majors will be notified while they are at the battlefront.

” The ones that are deployed are certainly the hardest,” Campbell told reporters. “What we try to do there is, working through the chain of command, minimize the impact to that unit and then maximize the time to provide to that officer to come back and do the proper transition, to take care of himself or herself, and the family.” “

” In this week’s stranger news, an 83-page document was procured by self-proclaimed “FOI Geek” Jason Smathers under the Freedom of Information Act. The document, created by the FBI’s Directorate of Intelligence Research Support Unit, features an “extensive—but far from exhaustive—list of shorthand and acronyms used on Twitter and other social media venues.”

The list contains more than 2,800 entries (you read that correctly) which the FBI asserts you “should find useful in your work or for keeping up with your children and/or grandchildren.” In case your child decides to tell you, “HGH”, during in the middle of a conversation, fret not, for now you can just pull out your handy dandy 83-page guide to internet slang and see that they’re obviously telling you “Haters Gonna Hate.” Duh.

With over 2,800 abbreviations on the list, there are understandably some strange ones which, based on a quick internet search, have literally never even been used. Imagine employing any of these in daily conversation, not to mention trying to memorize them:

Our tax dollars at work … Jeez . One would think that with all the threats to our way of life from those evil “right-wing extremists” , the need to change illegal’s diapers , arming terrorists and such that the Feds would have enough to do without spending a fortune studying social media acronyms … but one would be wrong , wouldn’t one ?

In Obama’s Amerika no job is to small for the hand of big government .

Miami-Dade County’s Community Information and Outreach department has been producing it, it said, to show around the holiday season and as a “team-building” exercise.

Most of the videos appear to be a series of skits involving images of drinking, dancing and dramatics apparently designed to be funny.

” Shocking” is how one county employee described it, who did not want to be identified for fear of losing their job.

One scene, for example, has images of one current and one former employee holding what appears to be beer and waiving dollar bills. All of this as the music says, “Bottoms up” and the two men are heard saying, “Cheers baby!”

Other parts have employees dancing to popular songs like “Gangnam Style.” “

” Cook County has long been ridiculed for allowing dead people cast votes, but the state may have just garnered a new distinction.

It paid $12 million in health care for people who were already dead — including in one case, for a person who had died in 1989.

A new financial audit released by Auditor General Bill Holland’s office on Thursday found that the Illinois Department of Health and Family Services had 8,232 people still on Medicaid rolls qualifying for benefits, even though they were dead.

The state paid monthly premiums totaling almost $7 million for 561 people who had already been dead for an average of nearly two years before they were enrolled in a state managed care program.

“ A person was dead for 663 days and then they were signed up for Managed Care,” an incredulous Holland told the Sun-Times. “They need to improve their system to ensure the death dates for current enrollees, and just to ensure that people who were deceased were not enrolled.”

” Australia’s conservative coalition is set to cut more than 90 percent of the funding related to global warming from their budget, from $5.75 billion this year to $500 million, over the next four years.

Environmentalists and leftist politicians in the country protested the move by conservative Liberal Party Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s governing coalition to slash funding for climate programs, arguing such funding for green energy and reducing carbon dioxide emissions were necessary to stop global warming.

But Abbott’s government shot back, saying that the country needed to reduce the size of government and improve the economy.

” The coalition government acknowledges the role of renewable energy in Australia’s energy mix,” said Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane. “There is over $1 billion in funding for existing renewable projects to be completed over the coming years.” “

” The Pentagon has awarded a contract to begin development of the most expensive helicopters ever made.

Each helicopter will probably cost at least $400 million. The entire project, to build at least 23 helicopters, has been estimated to eventually cost between $10 billion to $17 billion. By comparison, the project could pay the combined defense budgets of Finland, Norway, and Sweden for one year ($16.9 billion).

The passengers for this enormously expensive helicopter fleet? The President of the United States and his entourage.

Marine One helicopters must satisfy a number of requirements. The president’s helos must be small enough to land on the South Lawn, but large enough to lift 14 people and several thousand pounds of equipment a distance of 300 miles. The helicopters must be armored, with a bullet-resistant fuselage and glass.

Finally, the president’s helicopter must include a toilet.

The new, initial contract awarded to the American defense contractor Sikorsky, is valued at $1.24 billion. Under the terms of the new contract, the U.S. military will take delivery of two prototype helicopters—based on the Sikorsky S-92 medium helicopter–in 2016. Another 21 fully capable helicopters will follow.”

The S-92 can travel at 175 mph and is required to transport its passengers 300 uninterrupted miles , a distance it can cover in an hour and three quarters , yet a bathroom is a requirement ? WTF ? You mean to tell me that the passengers cannot hold their water for the time it takes to watch one feature length movie ?

Read more on this astoundingly arrogant waste of taxpayer funds by the Pentagon at The Daily Beast

” Judicial Watch reported that the Obamas have set a new record for vacations on the backs of Americans taxpayers. Remember, this included an extended stay in Hawaii for one Michele Obama, who wished to celebrate her 50th b-day at Oprah’s home there.

The conservative action group had to file a lawsuit to obtain the records from the US Air Force, marking a new low for US politics. The Obamas spent over $7.4 million during 2013, merely for flight expenses

* The outbound flight to California in August, 2013 for Obama to dine with Katzenberg and appear on the “The Tonight Show” cost taxpayers $1,209,926.40. The return flight to Washington cost $935,980.80. Flight expenditures alone came to $2,145,907.20.

* The outbound flight to Martha’s Vineyard for the Obama family’s August vacation cost taxpayers $890,323.20. The return flight to Washington cost $273,945.60. Flight expenditures alone came to $1,164,268.80.

* The grand total of $7,396,531.20, Judicial Watch pointed out, only accounted for flight expenses for the three trips.

“The fact is, the Obamas are abusing the public trust and the taxpayers with unnecessary luxurious vacations and travel,” Judicial Watch said. “These staggering costs show why these documents were covered-up and we had to sue in federal court to get them. Another transparency fail for the Obama gang, but thanks to our federal lawsuit it is another accountability win for the American taxpayer.”

” A couple of weeks back, I remarked on the cost of President Obama’s day-trip to Brussels, accompanied by 900 flunkeys and a 45-car motorcade. In fairness to Obama, the President is a public official of the Government of the United States: I do believe he’s even mentioned in the Constitution. You will search that document in vain for any mention of the office of “First Lady” or “First Offspring”. Nevertheless:

The documents reveal that taxpayers spent a total of at least $7,921,638.66 on the first lady’s trip. She departed for the Dublin tour on Air Force Two after accompanying the president on a meeting with Northern Ireland youth.

So “Air Force Two” has to be on hand to get Mrs Obama, Sasha and Malia the one hundred miles from Belfast to Dublin. For the purposes of comparison, flying the entire Royal Family around for a year costs taxpayers £3,101,771 (that’s the Queen, princes, dukes, the lot). Three million quid plus change works out to about $5,194,347.37. In other words, for the cost of two days in Dublin with three members of the Obama family you can keep the entire House of Windsor in the air for a year.”

” When it comes to tracking the cost of Obama family vacations there are two primary challenges. First, the Obamas are prolific jet-setters, so there are many details to track. And second, the Obama administration, clearly embarrassed by these lavish and frequent family vacations, stonewalls the release of records at every turn.

But we have been relentless in pursuit of this information. Our attorneys file the lawsuits and make our case, and our investigators pour through pages of records and crunch the numbers. And the information we’ve uncovered – information that would otherwise remain under lock and key – shows that the Obamas have a disturbing lack of regard for taxpayer resources.

Most recently, when reviewing the Obama family travel log, Judicial Watch recently obtained records from the U.S. Department of the Air Force and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security revealing that President Obama’s June 2013 trip to Belfast, Ireland, including a Dublin sightseeing side trip by Michelle Obama, her daughters, and her entourage, cost the taxpayers $7,921,638.66. (Per usual, and owing to the enormous public interest in Michelle Obama’s luxury travel, our discovery earned quite a bit of press coverage.)

Here’s the breakdown from the two agencies.

According to the Department of Air Force documents, the flights to, from, and around Ireland for the June 17 – 19, 2013 trip totaled 33.6 hours at $228,288 an hour, which comes to a flight expense alone of $7,670,476.80 (These records came in response to a Judicial Watch Freedom of Information lawsuit filed on January 13, 2014.)

According to the DHS documents, the total cost for “security and/or other services” for the Dublin side-trip by Michelle Obama and her entourage was $251,161.86, including $55,004.85 at the Shelbourne Hotel and $70,855.44 at the Westbury Hotel. Vehicle rental charges were $114,721. (These records also came in response to a Judicial Watch Freedom of Information lawsuit filed on January 13, 2014.)

Now I can hear the White House’s defense. This was a business trip. It’s all about diplomatic relations, etc., etc. And while this might at times be true for the president, it is certainly not true for the other members of the First Family.”

Disarming The Warriors

Published on Apr 11, 2014” We are defanging our military. What’s more, is that we are taking away their basic human rights to defend themselves, their Second Amendment rights to bear arms in their own self-defense, while asking them to volunteer to defend us. Moreover, we are choosing time and time again to deny them the mental health and veterans’ benefits, while giving more money to entitlements for other communities. Meanwhile, shootings on bases have occurred now multiple times, and 22 people in our armed services commit suicide daily. This is unacceptable–hear why in this Afterburner with Bill Whittle.”

” All of the Guard’s AH-64 Apache helicopters are scheduled to go to the activeArmy, and there’s nothing its top brass can do about it.

“ None of us like what we’re having to do,” National Guard Chief Gen. Frank Grass told members of the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday, the military website Defense One reported. “My big concern right now is figuring out how I’m going to move, and how many states I’m going to have an impact on, and what’s the cost of facilities and to retrain pilots. I’ve got to tackle that because the decision’s been made.”

Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ray Odierno told members of Congress on Tuesday that the move will save$12 billion through fiscal year 2017, Defense One reported.

When the logistics are worked out, the Army’s fleet of OH-58 Kiowa helicopters will be divested, its newly acquired Apaches will fill its reconnaissance and scouting needs, and the National Guard will be given UH-60 Black Hawks.”

Anybody who believes this is about saving money is deluded . This is a power grab pure and simple . While the Feds go about disarming the State guard units so as to deny the states any offensive air assets in the event of an “emergency” , the same Dept of Defense continues to up-armor local police departments with billions in free ordnance .

Here’s a cost saving idea General , how about you sell the excess MRAPS to allies , thus keeping them out of podunk towns across America and use the proceeds to let the National Guard to keep the Apaches . These ongoing deployments and re-deployments appear to be “battle space preparation” on the part of the Feds .

Looking at this situation from another angle , the disarming of the Guard plays right into the Obama administration’s continued efforts to destroy American readiness . The Guard has played a pivotal role in the “War on Terror” for the past decade and now the fliers will be unable to train . Just another sop to our enemies as King Obama softens us up for his terrorist cronies .

” Obama fearing a revolution against him by the states, has moved swiftly by nationalizing nearly all National Guard Forces in multiple states; Georgia, Alabama, Kansas, Minnesota, Tennessee, Virginia, Louisiana, South Carolina – to name a few. The Governors of the Great States of Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia still have under their Command-and-Control the State Defense Forces to go against U.S. Federal forces should the need arise. Also important to note: There are NO U.S. laws prohibiting National Guard troops from also joining their State’s Defense Forces. This dilemma occurred during the Civil War with many “citizen soldiers” choosing to serve their states instead of the Federal Government.”

President Obama & Vice President Biden Show Us How They Move

Jogging in their dress clothes … yeah , right . What a bunch of idiots . How much did this idiotic video cost the taxpayers ? Be sure to check out the comments on the Youtube page . Some of them are priceless .

” An alliance of drug companies and patient advocates, joined by Democrats and Republicans in Congress, is fiercely opposing an Obama administration proposal that would allow insurers to limit Medicare coverage for certain classes of drugs, including those used to treat depression and schizophrenia.

Opponents warn that the proposal, if enacted, could harm patients. Federal officials say it would lower costs and reduce overuse of the drugs.

The proposed rule, which would lift a requirement that insurers cover “all or substantially all” drugs in certain treatment areas, is just one of a series of changes to the drug program that are being opposed by the unlikely alliance. Even insurers and drug benefit managers, who have previously supported added limits on drug coverage, oppose the rule. They object to provisions including changes to so-called preferred pharmacy networks, where consumers are steered toward a limited network of pharmacies, and to reducing the number of plans that insurers can offer in any one region.”

So all that talk of drug rationing was just another conspiracy theory cooked up by the “vast right-wing conspiracy” , was it ?

In addition to all the buildings, the federal government owns and leases a remarkable 486,000 structures such as parking lots. The GSA reports that the annual operating costs for all the buildings and structures is $33 billion. The current market value of the buildings is unknown, but the government estimated that the replacement value in 2007 was $1.5 trillion.

A good way to save taxpayer money and increase economic efficiency would be to start privatizing these assets. The government itself says that it has about 77,000 buildings that are underutilized or unneeded.”

It’s no surprise that the government does a very poor job of maintaining the properties under it’s control . It’s the same old story , the best stewards of the land are the people that own it . Contrary to progressive belief conservation of anything is best left to the ones most directly affected . Human nature is such that care is directly related to cost .

” It is widely recognized that the government is a poor manager of its assets. The GAO has had federal property on its “high risk” waste list for years, and it has found that “many assets are in an alarming state of deterioration.” “

” Is the latest delay of ObamaCare regulations politically motivated? Consider what administration officials announcing the new exemption for medium-sized employers had to say about firms that might fire workers to get under the threshold and avoid hugely expensive new requirements of the law.

Obama officials made clear in a press briefing that firms would not be allowed to lay off workers to get into the preferred class of those businesses with 50 to 99 employees. How will the feds know what employers were thinking when hiring and firing? Simple.

Firms will be required to certify to the IRS – under penalty of perjury – that ObamaCare was not a motivating factor in their staffing decisions. To avoid ObamaCare costs you must swear that you are not trying to avoid ObamaCare costs. You can duck the law, but only if you promise not to say so.”

The slippery slope of State control just turned into a head-long plunge to the death of individual rights and private property .No longer may a business owner make employment decisions based on what’s best for the company . Now they are subject to the approval of Obama’s foot soldiers in the IRS . Good-bye private enterprise , hello state control of the means of production .